Dr Caroline Cantley, SRPe Executive Director

Dr Caroline Cantley is the Executive Director of the Scottish Research Partnership in Engineering (SRPe). Her career has spanned both industry and academia, focused on engineering, technology-based business and research. Her current role, as Executive Director of SRPe, involves providing leadership and strategic direction to the creation of critical mass in engineering in Scotland to help attract investment, leading researchers, industrial engagement, skills development and entrepreneurship and promote Scotland's strengths within the globalised world economy.

Her previous experience covers a broad spectrum of roles across industry and academia including providing technical consultancy advice and services to energy clients around the globe, strategic business and research leadership and on ground breaking collaborative multi-national projects such as the University of Glasgow Institute for Gravitational Research programme developing the LIGO detector network in the US.

Her focus is on the creation of value for the Scottish economy working closely with industry and the public sector / Scottish Government to drive increased research excellence, socio-economic impact and strategic skills development in areas critical to the future prosperity of Scotland and the UK.

She is a Chartered Physicist, Member of the Scottish Science Advisory Committee of the Scottish Government; Member of the Scottish Funding Council’s Research and Knowledge Exchange Committee; a Member of Education Scotland’s Higher Education and Industry STEM Coordination Group; a Member of the Council of Photonics Scotland; and Vice-Chair of the Physics Industrial Advisory Board of the University of the West of Scotland.

Caroline graduated with a first class BSc Hons in Physics with Geology in 1987 and a PhD in Experimental Physics from the University of Glasgow in 1991 where she developed vibration isolation and feedback control systems for gravitational wave detectors.